The US Army has awarded Sierra Nevada Corp $8.5 million for Tactical Automated Landing System components support for the RQ-7B tactical unmanned aircraft system (UAS).

Soldier performing pre-flight inspections on a RQ-7B Shadow (Picture source: US Army)

Sierra Nevada Corp., was awarded $8.5 million firm-fixed-price contract for Tactical Automated Landing System components support for the RQ-7B tactical UAS," the US Department of Defense said in a statement on March 6.

The RQ-7B UAS is used for reconnaissance, surveillance, target acquisition and battle damage assessment. Launched from a trailer-mounted pneumatic catapult, it is recovered with the aid of arresting gear similar to jets on an aircraft carrier. Its gimbal-mounted, digitally stabilized, liquid nitrogen-cooled electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) camera relays video in real time via a C-band line-of-sight data link to the ground control station (GCS).

Work is expected to be completed by February 27, 2023.

RQ-7B leaving its launcher (Picture source: US Army)